Scarlett's First Birthday! / Visitors / End of Bonding Leave / On the Precipice at Work
Scarlett is one year old! It's been such a fast year; it's hard to believe. She's walking quite well now and just about running. She waves at people and has really turned into a toddler. I think the true infant/baby phase is over. We celebrated with a party and invited friends and family. We opened our home to a bunch of visitors all at once which is unusual for us and it was kind of pandemonium for a while but it worked and it was a lot of fun. We didn't decorate too much but the party was essentially rabbit-themed. We had rabbit effigies everywhere and Scarlett wore a cute bunny dress that had a poofy tail and everything. It was adorable. The main event was a homemade carrot cake with frosting. This was the first large amount of sugar she'd ever had and after being unsure of what to do with the cupcake, she ate it all up. It was wild to have so many people here and we got a lot of great photos. Scarlett is so young that I'm sure she didn't think anything special was going on but she did enjoy everyone singing "Happy Birthday" to her. She lights up whenever we replay the footage we have of the event and that song comes on. She had a good time but whew; it was an effort.
We had Nicole's parents staying with us for a week during the festivities and that was a bit of a hardship. We don't really have a guest room anymore and I'm sleeping separately while Scarlett co-sleeps with Nicole, so I was on a makeshift twin-sized air mattress in the office for a whole week. I often wonder what it'll be like when Scarlett grows up enough to need her room all to herself and when people come for visits and we don't have a guest room, what will we do? Regardless, it's always worth it to have the in-laws here to hang out and it's always fun even though it's an adjustment for all of us. They also gave Nicole and me the rare opportunity to get out just the two of us. We went out for dinner at a nice restaurant and it was the first "date night" we'd had in over a year. We also had Nicole's Montana friend, Abby, and her family out here. They invited us to tag along on their day at the Oregon Zoo which allowed us to introduce Scarlett to a real zoo. It was a sunny, perfect day. In fact, the whole birthday week was pleasant and spring has certainly arrived.
Now that Scarlett is 1, I've had to finish using up the last of my sixteen weeks of paternity (or bonding) leave. It's been nice having more of it left to look forward to but now that it's gone, I'm staring down months of unbroken work weeks ahead of me. I shouldn't be unhappy because this is how it would be normally but I really enjoyed having those sixteen weeks! We used that time to lump together doctor visits and appointments and trips and now it'll be somewhat more difficult as we have to accomplish these things during work days. But we'll make it work. We always do.
Speaking of work, my job and my outlook on it hasn't changed much lately. I'm unhappy with the role I've been in and now that I've been in it seven whole months, I'm going to approach my management and ask for a transfer out to a different group where my programming skills will be better developed and needed. I probably could have done this months ago but I've been coasting as long as I could to really make sure of this decision. I know my management will ask if I'm really sure about this but it's been seven whole months and I don't see my attitude improving. Hopefully in my next entry there'll be good news because right now I'm neck-deep in the stress of worrying about what will happen when I tell my boss I want to go somewhere else...
We had Nicole's parents staying with us for a week during the festivities and that was a bit of a hardship. We don't really have a guest room anymore and I'm sleeping separately while Scarlett co-sleeps with Nicole, so I was on a makeshift twin-sized air mattress in the office for a whole week. I often wonder what it'll be like when Scarlett grows up enough to need her room all to herself and when people come for visits and we don't have a guest room, what will we do? Regardless, it's always worth it to have the in-laws here to hang out and it's always fun even though it's an adjustment for all of us. They also gave Nicole and me the rare opportunity to get out just the two of us. We went out for dinner at a nice restaurant and it was the first "date night" we'd had in over a year. We also had Nicole's Montana friend, Abby, and her family out here. They invited us to tag along on their day at the Oregon Zoo which allowed us to introduce Scarlett to a real zoo. It was a sunny, perfect day. In fact, the whole birthday week was pleasant and spring has certainly arrived.
Now that Scarlett is 1, I've had to finish using up the last of my sixteen weeks of paternity (or bonding) leave. It's been nice having more of it left to look forward to but now that it's gone, I'm staring down months of unbroken work weeks ahead of me. I shouldn't be unhappy because this is how it would be normally but I really enjoyed having those sixteen weeks! We used that time to lump together doctor visits and appointments and trips and now it'll be somewhat more difficult as we have to accomplish these things during work days. But we'll make it work. We always do.
Speaking of work, my job and my outlook on it hasn't changed much lately. I'm unhappy with the role I've been in and now that I've been in it seven whole months, I'm going to approach my management and ask for a transfer out to a different group where my programming skills will be better developed and needed. I probably could have done this months ago but I've been coasting as long as I could to really make sure of this decision. I know my management will ask if I'm really sure about this but it's been seven whole months and I don't see my attitude improving. Hopefully in my next entry there'll be good news because right now I'm neck-deep in the stress of worrying about what will happen when I tell my boss I want to go somewhere else...